Public Bill Committee

[Mr. Joe Benton in the Chair]

Phil Woolas: I beg to move,
That the Order of the Committee [30 January], as amended [8 February], be varied as follows—
In paragraph 1(g) leave out ‘and 4.30 p.m.’.
The effect of the amendment will be to allow members of the Committee to attend the GLA debate on Tuesday afternoon.

Alistair Burt: We are happy to accept that. It is regrettable that a bit of shuffling is needed because the Department has Bills running at the same time, but that happens in a busy Department. I am sure that we can accommodate the amendment and ensure that we work to a timetable on which we can all agree.

Andrew Stunell: I am certainly content with the motion, although I note that we might need to work late occasionally to make up the time.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 39

Executive arrangements for England

Amendment proposed [this day]: No. 38, in clause 39, page 22, line 28, leave out subsection (6).—[Andrew Stunell.]

Question again proposed, That the amendment be made.

Joe Benton: I remind the Committee that with this we are discussing the following amendments: No. 39, in clause 40, page 23, leave out line 19.
No. 40, in clause 40, page 23, leave out line 36.
No. 41, in clause 41, page 26, leave out line 13.
No. 43, in clause 41, page 28, leave out lines 10 to 15.
No. 45, in clause 41, page 29, leave out line 33.

Phil Woolas: I thank the hon. Gentlemen for accepting the motion. The pace of devolution takes parliamentary time, and I am glad to see that the other Bill sponsored by the Department is proceeding as well.
When we adjourned, I was putting my argument against the amendment tabled by the hon. Member for Hazel Grove, which would delete the option of directly elected executives. Although that option probably will not be taken up widely by local government, the Government want to make it available.
I shall fulfil my undertaking to provide some of the evidence that the hon. Member for North-East Bedfordshire asked for in relation to findings on the changes made under the Local Government Act 2000. A number of pieces of research independent of Government have found improvements in the decision making, performance and leadership of councils as a result of the changes. Perhaps most prominent is the “State of the English Cities” report published in 2006, which laid particular emphasis on the economic success of local authority areas as a result of enhanced leadership. Research on best value in 2006 also showed that leadership was
“the single most significant driver of change and improvement in local authorities”.
There is a positive correlation between political leadership and the representative package of best value performance indicators.
Our Department—or its predecessor, the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister; the Department changes its name every now and again—carried out research in 2003. The local government workplace front-line staff survey—we have always gone for snappy titles—showed that front-line staff in the authorities that were performing less well, that is, those that the Audit Commission identified as weak or poor, were significantly more likely than those in good or excellent authorities to say that they needed better leadership by senior officers.

Alistair Burt: Ten out of 10 for artistic impression—that is an heroic effort to justify the Government’s proposals, but I remind the Minister of what we are talking about. We are trying not to get some measure of the importance of strong leadership in delivering effective local government—that is taken as read—but to justify the Minister’s and the Government’s contention that the desire for directly elected executives has been a ripple running through local government, stimulated by local government and councils themselves. It is not about research bodies talking about strong leadership or others commenting on it, but about finding the spark in the local government system that said, “We want this, and we want it now.” Despite the Minister’s best efforts, I am still uncertain that we are talking about a mass movement beyond two or three councillors thinking that it might be a good idea.

Phil Woolas: As ever, the hon. Gentleman advances an heroic argument to justify inaction. As my evidence shows, the Government’s strategy for improving local government has proved to be working. One element of that strategy—I concede that it is only one—is our emphasis on better leadership of local authorities.

David Burrowes: The evidence that the Minister is bravely offering to try to justify his argument refers to “officers”. Much though councillors want to say that the leadership issue is about them, officers’ leadership is important as well. In my borough of Enfield, the change of leadership of the elected councillors, a change of officers at senior level and a much more streamlined leadership approach led to improvements, as the Audit Commission results this week will show.

Phil Woolas: I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving me the opportunity to pay tribute to the chief executives and senior officers. The Local Government Association and the Government—if it is not immodest of me to say so—should be congratulated on the emphasis that they placed on the importance of chief executives and senior officers. The Society of Local Authority Chief Executives and Senior Managers should be congratulated on performing the tasks that we ask the chief executives to carry out, especially when we bear in mind councils’ partnership arrangements, whereby chief executives at management leadership level take on a raft of responsibilities. They serve their areas and the country well. We should all be proud of that on a non-partisan basis.
 Our research included senior officers and frontline staff. The work on best value that was commissioned in 2006 showed the importance of leadership. The front-line staff survey backed that finding by considering authorities in the different categories. An evaluation survey in 2004 also backed the findings, showing, for example, that leadership by executive members was positively associated with the joining up of services and the better delivery of services to local people. In that survey, 71 per cent. of the respondents believed that leadership by executive councillors had had a positive impact on performance improvements in their authority.
 A survey of councillors, officers and other interested parties in 2005 followed consideration of the impact of the Local Government Act 2000. Opposition Members, reasonably and rightly, often call for post-legislative scrutiny, and evidence on the 2000 Act shows that the role of leader was perceived to have become stronger by 79 per cent. of respondents in the case of authorities with an elected mayor, and by 69 per cent. of respondents in the case of other authorities. More than half the councillors and nearly three-quarters of the officers believed that the executive had become more effective in articulating the vision for their area under the new arrangements.
The latest research from the ongoing evaluation of the new councils’ constitution is being undertaken by the university of Manchester, which has played a very positive role in research on local government, as it has in every discipline of learning. It is probably the finest university in the United Kingdom. It found that 69 per cent. of councillors and 76 per cent. officers perceived the role of the leader to be stronger under the new executive arrangements. Moreover, some 52 per cent. of councillors and 72 per cent. of officers believed that the executive is more effective in articulating its vision for its area under the new arrangements, and 53 per cent. of councillors and 62 per cent. of officers believe that the executive has led the drive to service performance.
That is substantial evidence. Of course, it is reasonable for hon. Members on both sides of the Committee, to want evidence that accountability and scrutiny have gone hand in hand in that process.

Bob Neill: I understand the Minister’s point, but where is the specific evidence that a directly elected leader and executive contribute? We all accept the general point, but how many local authorities in the research specifically said, “We want to have a directly elected leader and executive,” as opposed to the model of a leader and executive cabinet appointed by the local authority?

Phil Woolas: Once again, I invite the hon. Gentleman to come out of his centralist mindset and join me in the devolutionary world, where the matter is one for local authorities or, in the case of referendums for the position of elected mayor, for the local people to decide.
 I referred to the strong support for the idea that the mayoral model has created an improvement in leadership, albeit not hugely greater than other executive arrangements—10 per cent. or thereabouts. An interesting piece of evidence for elected Members of Parliament and elected councillors who read this debate is that 68 per cent. of people surveyed in areas where there is an elected mayor knew the name of the mayor and who was responsible for their area, as opposed to 37 per cent. of people in a non-mayoral area recognising their council leader. That figure compares reasonably with Members of Parliament and shows that, in areas that have chosen to go for a mayor, the mayor’s high visibility has helped accountability. But—there is a big but, of course—the Government are not saying and have never said, “Thou shalt have a mayor.” We have said simply, “If you want one, you can have one,” in order to improve leadership arrangements.

Philip Dunne: I would like to take the Minister back to his remarks a few moments ago, when he stressed the importance of local authorities determining for themselves the structure of executive arrangements that they wish to take forward. Why has he excluded a hybrid committee structure in conjunction with an elected leader or mayor? That system has worked well in many local authorities—I am sure that we will come on to that point later in the debate. Why cannot local authorities determine the structure for themselves?

Phil Woolas: The hon. Gentleman makes a reasonable point, which many authorities across the spectrum have made, asking, “Why can’t we have committees?” You would probably pull me up if I were to go into detail on that, Mr. Benton, because we are discussing the amendment on directly elected mayors tabled by the hon. Member for Hazel Grove. I shall just say “horse” and “camel”, and perhaps you will get a hint of the argument that I shall use when we consider the evidence of the success or otherwise of the committee structure. I refer, of course, to the idea that God so loved the earth that he sent his only son, not a committee, and if you try to design a horse by committee you end up with a camel.
If we seriously want to devolve strategic power over billions of pounds of public expenditure, the public will want accountable leadership and clear decision-making structures. That is my argument on the executive models. The hon. Member for Hazel Grove has put strongly an argument against the model of directly elected executives, arguing that it is unworkable and that support for it among local authorities is not huge. I argue that it is a reasonable model that has been proposed by some in local government and that satisfies the criteria that the Government have set in their policy. I invite the hon. Gentleman to put aside his centralising tendencies and join me in the idea that councils that want to take forward that model should be allowed to do so. I therefore invite him to withdraw the amendment.

Andrew Stunell: Some of the Minister’s words have been carefully noted down for subsequent debates. When I moved the amendment I prefaced my remarks by making it absolutely clear that, like everybody else in the room, I am in favour of strong leadership models. Obviously, what is in dispute is whether a particular style of governance is more or less likely to produce that strong leadership and positive outcomes for local authorities. There is clearly a difference of opinion between the Minister and myself on his other proposed models, but they are not the subject of the amendments before us.
I am appearing almost passionate about this group of amendments—that is how the Minister was kind enough to describe it—because the Government’s proposal is completely dysfunctional. It will not work. I cannot see how it could be made to work in a way that would allow a local authority to have strong leadership. The proposal is based on a series of premises that appears to be completely disconnected from any experience of how local government is run or indeed how any Government is run. At no point did the Minister make the case for a directly elected Cabinet in Whitehall. If we contemplate what that would produce, and the side effects, we will see that it would be as wrong for the governing party as for opposition parties and the country as a whole. As soon as we look at that model in a more familiar setting, it becomes transparent that it is completely dysfunctional.
A number of other points have been raised in the debate. Several Members commented on the problems that might arise from changes to control, capacity or aptitude, and on the necessity of bringing in new people during a four-year term or to rotate portfolios. All those things are ruled out by the proposed model. Such failings would mean less strong leadership than under the current executive model, whatever its strengths and weaknesses.
The Minister’s justification is that the system he proposes will improve accountability. It is extremely difficult to follow his argument when presented in that form. It will improve accountability in the sense that the people involved will be directly elected once every four years, but if it all goes wrong and after two years the directly-elected leader says, “It has all gone wrong in social services and I would really like to get rid of this person, but I cannot and you cannot blame me because I am trapped by the system,” where is the accountability? Who is loses an election on that basis? There is no accountability.
One wonders also about scrutiny. Let us suppose that a major gaffe is disclosed when scrutinising a particular department and the performance of the executive member directly elected to handle it. Scrutiny can be as condemnatory as it likes, but it cannot actually remove or hold to account that person, who can simply wave two fingers at the scrutiny committee and say, “I have got another two and a half years to serve and there is no way that you can touch me.” If that is accountability, the Minister has got a different view of it from the one that I hold and that I think that the Committee should also hold.
 As hard as I read the Bill, I cannot get to the bottom of another aspect of the system. We have raised already the question of what happens if a subsequent by-election produces a change of party in the representatives elected to the council. The Minister did not specifically address that point—perhaps because he has no idea. However, it seems possible that what we really have here is an aldermanic system. If the directly elected executive can vote in the council, one could take the view that any change in control or, at least, the balance of the council, could be overwhelmed by the 10 or 12 additional votes of the directly elected executive. If that is true, it raises one question: what is the point or substance of any by-election of change that take place?
The system completely defeats the notion of increasing accountability, and puts pitfall after pitfall in the way of exercising strong, accountable leadership.

Patrick Hall: I am trying to follow the hon. Gentleman’s logic. His argument is stronger if he envisages that the executive would be independent, but the chances are that it would consist of party representatives, like the rest of the council. Although the executive’s members would be elected for the district rather than the ward, they would probably be party people, so they would always be counted as part of the council.

Andrew Stunell: The hon. Gentleman raises the lid on the Pandora’s box of who is entitled to propose a slate, on what basis, and of what size. Let me accept the premise that he has offered, however. If one takes Stockport as an example, there could be a slate from the Liberal Democrats, one from the Labour party and one from the Conservative party, and perhaps one from some other group. On the basis of the Government’s present proposals as I understand them, there would be a fixed number on the slate, so there would be no scope for a party to compete by saying that it could run a borough more efficiently and effectively with five, seven, or 11 people, because the number would be a predetermined one. That is clearly a mistake, and I assume that when we reach the relevant amendment the Government will confess as much.
There will be by-elections in a variety of wards across Stockport, depending on which slate gets in, and there could then be a change in the council’s composition if the electorate decided—perhaps on a very low turnout—that it did not like what had happened. At that point, the executive would no longer have the political support of the council in delivering its policies. Indeed, it might be said that the executive would no longer be legitimate, and that the electorate had decided that it did not want the executive members to be the decision makers. Where is the accountability and the legitimacy in that? So every door and window that one opens in examining the proposal produces a more and more bizarre view and a less and less workable system.
 It is fine for the Minister to say that the Government are just giving an option. That is what they did in Stoke, but after three years they have had to concede that the option did not work in local government. What I am saying is that the Government have taken away one option that they have decided is not workable and that, although they are offering three others, one of those is already predictably and visibly not workable. In effect, therefore, they are reducing the options to two, while claiming to be widening the choice open to local authorities. I cannot make any sense of the Government’s arguments and I believe that the proposal is mistaken. I shall press the amendment to a Division.

Question put, That the amendment be made:—

The Committee divided: Ayes 7, Noes 10.

Question accordingly negatived.

Clause 39 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 40

Discharge of functions

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

Alistair Burt: I have a couple of general questions. I am not sure what is behind the substitution of the title “senior executive member” for “elected mayor” in the clause, and I would be grateful if the Minister could let us know.

Phil Woolas: I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question. To which provisions is he referring specifically?

Alistair Burt: Throughout the clause, the term “elected mayor” is taken out and “senior executive member” is substituted. I wondered what the rationale for doing that was. It is a genuine question—I simply do not know.

Phil Woolas: Perhaps if I explain the purpose of the clause, that will answer the question.
Sections 14 to 16 of the 2000 Act deal with how functions are discharged by the executive of a local authority. Specifically, they provide that functions that are the responsibility of an executive may be discharged by members of the executive, committees of the executive, or officers of the council. Currently, where there is a mayor and cabinet executive, the mayor can either discharge a particular function or arrange for that function to be discharged by the executive, an individual member of the executive, a committee of the executive, or an officer of the authority. By contrast, where there is a leader and cabinet executive, it is the authority as a whole that makes those decisions unless, of course, it leaves those decisions to the leader.
 Clause 39, which we have just debated, makes changes to the form of executive arrangements in England. As a consequence, clause 40 provides that, in future, all decisions about how executive functions will be discharged should remain in the hands of the mayor in the case of a mayoral executive; similarly, they should rest with the leader in the case of either a leader and cabinet executive or an elected executive, as in the model that we have just debated.
That means that, in future, all council leaders in England will have the same powers as mayors currently have to decide how executive functions are discharged. The arrangements in Wales, subject to the caveats that I referred to earlier, will remain unaltered. Therefore clause 40 strengthens the role of the leader and will help to deliver the conditions for the strong and accountable leadership that we have been discussing.
The provisions in the clause apply to all three models, so it is helpful to have a single term that refers to all three models, because the Bill, if Parliament allows it, will place the executive power in the leader’s office, whether that be a mayor, a directly elected leader of a directly elected executive, or an indirectly elected leader. It is simply common sense to have a single term.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 40 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 41

Changing governance arrangements

Andrew Stunell: I beg to move amendment No. 33, in clause 41, page 24, line 16, leave out ‘move to executive arrangements’.

Joe Benton: With this, it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments: No. 34, in clause 41, page 24, leave out lines 19 to 31 and insert—
‘(2) Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 33A and 33B, any principal council may submit a scheme of internal governance appropriate to its circumstances which shall stand deferred until the next election to the council.
(3) Where no recognised group has overall control, it shall be competent for the council to implement other arrangements as it may determine.’.
No. 100, in clause 41, page 24, line 26, leave out from ‘is’ to end of line 28 and insert
‘eligible for alternative arrangements if it is a district council or a metropolitan borough.’.
No. 99, in clause 41, page 24, line 28, leave out ‘85,000’ and insert ‘850,000’.
No. 101, in clause 41, page 24, leave out lines 29 to 31.
No. 35, in clause 41, page 24, leave out lines 36 to 38.
No. 36, in clause 41, page 24, line 41, leave out from ‘arrangements’ to end of line 1 on page 25.

Andrew Stunell: I remind the Minister that he has now admonished the hon. Member for North-East Bedfordshire, the hon. Member for Ludlow and me, asking us to come out of our centralist mindset. I am not sure whether he has suggested that other Members should do the same. I am giving the Minister a chance to walk the walk, as well as talk the talk about coming out of his centralist mindset.
 I shall start my remarks by saying that clause 41 is six and a half pages long. Whatever else, there should be a law against that. Consequently, the Committee should carefully consider the amendments to see precisely what I intend to achieve. I shall simplify matters by explaining that amendments Nos. 33 and 34 would give local authorities freedom to determine their own system of governance; amendments Nos. 99 and 101 would give authorities the option of having the committee system in certain circumstances; and amendment No. 100 would extend the eligibility of special arrangements to district and metropolitan boroughs without regard to their size.
The Government propose that small authorities should be able to retain what is commonly called the committee system, although most people understand that the system of 25 years ago is not what we are talking about. We are debating an enhanced committee system. My amendments would open up the options for local government of all sizes and classes, first, to decide their own system of governance entirely; secondly, to decide their system of governance and to have the committee system, if they are district councils or metropolitan boroughs regardless of size; and, thirdly, to be able to adopt the committee system if their population exceeds, not 85,000, but 850,000. Both numbers are arbitrary, but my intention is to show the direction in which I believe the Minister should be encouraged to go.
Let me deploy the arguments in favour of self-government. As I said on Second Reading, we conceded it long ago to Australia, Canada and colonies throughout the world, and it seems to work. They get on with it, so the Minister should have a little more trust in local government and its capacity to deliver and show leadership. It became clear on Second Reading that many of his colleagues share that view and feel that he is being too prescriptive, in particular by not allowing the possibility of the enhanced committee system to be an option for consideration by authorities unless they are in the smallest category. He is denying local democracy an opportunity.
There is plenty of anecdotal evidence of the dissatisfaction in local government about the executive arrangements. I tried to follow the 69 per cent., the 74 per cent. and the 89 per cent. figures that the Minister rattled off when referring to various studies. I do not know what the sample groups were when those were undertaken, but I have yet to find outside the membership of the executives themselves councillors who would agree with that analysis. Most of them consider that they have been excluded to some degree by the new arrangements. Many councils believe that they should have the option of the committee structure, one that is much more inclusive and inclined to consensus building than the executive model and much less remote from the communities that they serve.
 I am not an unadulterated supporter of the committee system. I am far from saying to the Minister that every local authority should have it. I am certainly not arguing that we should go back 20 years and start all over again. However, if what he says about opening up local government and giving it more choices and options really means anything, he has a simple, practical way of doing that, which is by extending a system of governance that is tried and tested—and certainly not failing—into other council areas.
 I want to make the pure gospel point that governance should be entirely a matter for local councils, but I listened carefully to what the Minister said on Second Reading and to what has been said in Committee and I know that his Department has struck a deal with other Government Departments about devolving functions and decision making to local government. To some extent, that deal is dependent on the Department for Communities and Local Government being able to show other Departments that the bodies to which it will be transferring powers and decision making have the substance and the effectiveness to carry out those functions. Therefore, a deal has been struck, and perhaps the governance issue is one of the prices that local government is expected to pay to achieve that.
I think that the whole Committee would benefit from a clear exposition by the Minister of exactly why neither he nor his Department is prepared to give any flexibility for the enhanced committee system. The amendments explore different options and different ways of achieving essentially the same thing, which is to widen the choices available to local government. They are not looking to bring in a system that is untried, untested and clearly dysfunctional, but to bring in something that is tried, tested and that demonstrably produces leadership results now in small authorities and which historically has done the same for more than 100 years in the largest authorities in the land. I am very happy to speak to the amendments and to listen to what the Minister has to say.

Alistair Burt: I am pleased to support the tenor of the amendments and to thank the hon. Gentleman for introducing them. Although we might be covering some old ground, I hope that they will encourage Committee members to reaffirm their commitment to the importance of choice in local government and to express again their concerns that a key manifestation of that choice in the present context would be to allow councils that so wished to propose and maintain an enhanced committee system.
The witnesses whom we heard expressed no doubt that that option would be broadly welcomed. Let me give some examples from their evidence. We had a debate that involved the three representatives of the Local Government Association. Jeremy Beecham was not keen to go back, so that is one vote against an enhanced committee system. When asked about his position on the options, Richard Kemp, the Liberal Democrat representative, said that
“it would be an option that I would support. I do not think that anyone wants to go back to the old committee system”—
the point made by the hon. Member for Hazel Grove—
“I do not think that anyone pines for that system, but an enhanced committee system, based on the experience that we have now, would be possible.”
So, that is one each. However, Simon Milton, representing the Conservatives on the LGA, said:
“I regretted the fact that councils were not given the option to have a committee system under the original Local Government Act. To be consistent, I would welcome that option, although I am not sure whether my council would go back to that system.”——[Official Report, Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Public Bill Committee, 30 January 2007; c. 20.]
That is two votes in favour of choice.
I will return to a familiar theme that the Minister must now hear echoing in his dreams. I do not know whether he caught that wonderful programme “Sleep Clinic” on the television last night that looked at the extraordinary contortions that people go through when their sleep is disturbed, what they hear and what they do not hear. I hope that the hon. Gentleman is hearing in his dreams, “choice, choice,” and at some stage tonight that he will share again that champagne moment that he gave to the Committee earlier when, as members of the Committee will recall, he spread open his arms and said, “I am a devolutionist, let them have the choice.” He said that in relation to a different part of the Bill, but, as the hon. Member for Hazel Grove said, all we are asking is that the Minister finds again in his soul that moment. He made that comment in relation to offering the choice of a committee system. He was not talking about forcing it upon anyone, not demanding that anyone has to have it, but simply giving people at local level their opportunity to choose a committee system for themselves.
Another voice from one of our witnesses was that of Gordon Keymer. The very name strikes a chord in all our hearts. Asked about the committee system and the problem of involvement, he said:
“What is happening too much at the moment in the executive system is that council meetings are dominated by two or three people and the rest are spectators. The figures speak for themselves—note the turnover of people who stay for only one term and leave because they are frustrated. The trouble is that we are trying to produce a whole lot of mechanisms to keep them happy by extending scrutiny and so on. If you look at it quite cold-bloodedly, all those things could be covered by active membership in the committee system. It is a great shame. People are not easily fooled.”
He said that when he goes down to watch his local council committees at work of an evening he thinks,
“Here are people who, from the very beginning, can involve themselves in local government, learn to speak and debate with officers and graduate to the council chamber and the full council meeting.”——[Official Report, Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Public Bill Committee, 30 January 2007; c. 41.]
That is what Gordon Keymer used to see on the committees on his council that he oversaw. That opportunity to learn and grow is not there now.

Tom Levitt: I get the impression that the hon. Gentleman is talking about the difference made by a well run council that engages councillors, be they there principally to make decisions or to scrutinise. That is the real difference that he is describing. Is there not a great danger of assuming that scrutiny is a lesser role and therefore less satisfying when, in fact, scrutiny is an important role when it is done and managed well?

Alistair Burt: The hon. Gentleman makes a fair point, but a slightly distracting one. I am not seeking to prioritise the business pursued by committees over the functions of scrutiny and overview. The point is that local authorities should be allowed to make a choice about the structure that they believe is right for them, so that well run councils can make a judgment about the allocation of functions and their efficacy. The question asked by the amendments, following the points raised by hon. Members on both sides of the House on Second Reading and by the witnesses who came before us prior to the formal Committee stage of the Bill, is: why not give people the choice? That is all. A committee system may not be right for all councils. For example, it may not suit councils that have moved on to a different system and do not want to go back.
 The overwhelming impression I had was that while it suits the leadership of a council to have a tightly controlled system, and a leadership will naturally support and understand an executive system that concentrates power, those who see the other purpose of a council as involving councillors so that they have more of a role than that of back-bench councillor—a role that people warmly welcome, but which keeps them out of the loop in the system—want the chance to do something more. I am sure that grass-roots resentment does not necessarily surface in those councils in which the executive and cabinet system works well, and which have mechanisms to get people involved, but to deny that there is resentment would be to shut one’s eyes to what is going on in local authorities.
 I come back to the point made so well by Gordon Keymer about the frustration of people who come on to councils and feel trammelled in what they can do. We have enough evidence from over the years of people who have gone on to councils and then complained that they get told what to do by central Government too much and that they are frustrated by it. They then go into a system in which they cannot even express themselves through committees, and they feel constrained. No wonder people are walking out the door.
There is a simple mechanism that we can use. It is not to force councils to go down a particular route, nor to demand that there is a particular structure of local governance that they should all follow; it is to add another element to the mix for effective government. If the Minister is going to argue that he cannot in any circumstances foresee that a committee structure could provide effective leadership in the manner of the models already presented, I have to say that I doubt that such an argument will be supported by the broad mass of people who have been involved with local government over the past few decades.
Earlier, the Minister made the point that the issue is about quality of leadership and individual powers of persuasion in many cases, but the right people, the right structure and the right officers can make a local authority work. I do not see any reason why the Bill should not contain the option for authorities to have the opportunity to run the committee system if that is what they want to do.
The matter that we are debating is one of the strongest arguments against the Minister’s belief that he is a devolutionary Minister of a non-centralising Government who are prepared to take a risk in local government. If the Minister is true to the moment that he gave us with such splendour before lunchtime, this is the opportunity for him to relive that moment, to confess himself to be a true devolutionist and to say in a heartfelt manner, “Let them choose.” I am therefore delighted to support the amendments, and I hope that we can hear something from the Minister and indeed from his Back-Bench colleagues that will echo the sentiment of setting our local councils free.

David Burrowes: I rise to support my hon. Friend and the hon. Member for Hazel Grove. I have the benefit of 12 years’ experience as a local councillor, first as an opposition councillor under the old committee system in Enfield, then in control as a cabinet member. Having been on two sides of the fence, I can give my view, both as a new councillor who was one of the youngest councillors elected in a committee structure and as a cabinet member.
The benefit of the committee format was that, at the very least, one knew where to go for information. The Minister has put forward in favour of an executive type arrangement the benefit of strong leadership. As a cabinet member, I certainly saw that, but there was a concern about those who were left behind. There was a feeling among other councillors who were newly elected under the cabinet model, which Enfield council adopted at an early stage, that they were left behind. Many well qualified councillors felt that they were not able to access information and were not party to decision making. They had to play catch-up to find out where the decision had been made and then subject it to scrutiny. New councillors do not feel sufficiently part of the scrutiny arrangements that form part of cabinet-style government. Councillors in Enfield often felt disfranchised and inadequately served by the scrutiny process. For all its imperfections, I say that the committee system suits every model of governance. It was certainly of value in Enfield, because people knew where to receive information.
When the Minister talked about sample groups that support the new executive arrangements, he did not mention the public. One should not forget that turnouts for local government elections have not dramatically increased across the board, despite some steps having been taken to improve leadership. There is still a major issue concerning community engagement, both of the public and of individual councillors on their behalf. When one talks about leadership, it is not only about executive leadership; it is about community leadership.
I understand that part of the intention of the 2000 changes was that community leadership should be upheld also by local councillors, as community advocates, who are not necessarily part of the executive. Without the option of a community system, they have felt increasingly disengaged. Without such a system, when the public are looking for information and seeking to find out about debates before decisions have been made, they are left to encourage councillors to call in a decision or to be part of a scrutiny process, which often feels inadequate. An option for a local authority to have a local community system should be provided.
One looks in desperation for consistency in the Bill. If the Minister is consistent, when he says there needs to be a stronger local voice for councils serving a population of more than 85,000 I presume he also thinks there should be a stronger local voice for populations of fewer than 85,000. What is the logic of not allowing a committee system for populations of fewer than 85,000? Why does it come down to the size of the population? Surely that stronger local voice should be there for them. If the logic of the Minister’s argument is that the option of a committee system should be taken away from those smaller population communities, it does not make sense.
 Certainly the committee option available to populations of under 85,000 should also be there for those over 85,000. The option should be there for the sake of not just executive leadership but community leadership. It is important for individual councils to feel properly empowered and engaged in the process. If that means an option of a committee, so be it. Let the Minister take off the shackles of the centralising tendencies he sees in us and ensure that there is true choice for local communities. I support the amendment.

Peter Soulsby: It was clear from the way that my hon. Friend the Minister spoke about the Government’s intentions in bringing forward this range of governance options that they are rightly concerned that local authorities should be capable of strong leadership. That strong leadership should be stable and visible. Those were the words that the Minister used to describe the sort of leadership we would want to see. He also spoke convincingly about the need for local authorities to provide, as many already do, strong leadership not just within their organisations but in the wider communities that they represent.
I am convinced that all hon. Members share the desire that local authorities should provide that leadership both internally and externally. I am also sure that no hon. Member would wish to see a return to the committee structure that many of us used to know, with all its frustrations and its inability to provide the sort of leadership that we would all wish for in local government, or, in many cases, to provide the accountability which we would also wish to see strengthened. It was often difficult to tell who was responsible for taking decisions within the committee structure, with each committee often able to blame another for the byways and alleyways that decision making was going down.

John Pugh: The hon. Gentleman might be exaggerating a little. I can recall things called policy and resources committees that used to make all the hard decisions that other councillors feared to make. It was very similar to the modern cabinet.

Peter Soulsby: I do indeed recall the strengths of that system as well as its weaknesses. I am convinced that those strengths can be used to produce a reformed committee structure and a system that would enable the leadership and accountability that we have all said we would wish local government to deliver. The two great advantages of the committee system were that it enabled a wide range of members to become engaged in the decision-making process in a useful way and, equally importantly, that it enabled opposition members to sit around the table to debate and to vote on matters on which decisions were being taken.
 One of the great frustrations of the present structure for councillors, whether in opposition or part of a controlling group, is that they cannot directly participate in the decision-making process. They cannot speak and vote at cabinet meetings in many situations. Obviously the political make-up of many councils occasionally enables them to take part, but in many it does not.

Sitting suspended for a Division in the House.

On resuming—

Peter Soulsby: I stress again that I am not arguing for a return to the committee structure as it was 20 or 30 years ago, but for the committee structure, much modified and modernised, to be included in the range of options open to local government. We do not need to think very hard to come up with some excellent examples of powerful leadership in councils with a committee structure and we do not need to think too hard about examples of effective community leadership being provided by councils with a committee structure. That leadership can be provided externally as well as internally.
The committee structure, much modified and much modernised, is not a panacea, but it ought at least to be an option. I also argue that the governance options that have been put forward by the Minister and the Government in the Bill are not a panacea either. They, too, are capable of being expanded to increase the range of opportunities open to local councils.
There is no doubt at all that it is vital for councils to be able to provide leadership to their local communities and for there to be strong and effective leadership within local authorities. There is no doubt at all that it is vital that whatever governance structure is adopted, it is accountable both internally and externally to the wider community and that the major issue of how the majority of members are engaged in the council’s process needs to be addressed.

John Pugh: The hon. Gentleman is making me quite nostalgic for the committee system. One of its advantages for scrutiny and accountability was that officers’ recommendations, which often turn out to be what the council actually does, were subject to extensive examination from back-bench and opposition councillors, which simply does not happen today. I find that there are few pleas from officers to go back to the committee system, and there could be a good reason for that.

Peter Soulsby: I certainly believe that when opposition members, if there is overall control, or coalition members if there is not, sit round a table in public discussing recommendations put in front of them by officers and are required to debate them and answer questions about their attitude towards them and the reasoning behind their position, that provides a degree of clarity and accountability that is not always provided in the current system. In at least some authorities, cabinet meetings are little more than a staged ritual in front of the present public, with decisions in fact being taken elsewhere.

Patrick Hall: When I was on Bedfordshire county council there were many advantages to the committee system. However, one of the disadvantages was the amount of time that it sometimes took for a decision to be taken because of the interminable sub-committees and perhaps sub-sub-committees—I cannot remember how many there were. I invite my hon. Friend to elaborate a little on what some call an enhanced committee system or, as I believe he called it, a modernised committee system. We need to know more about that because I do not believe that any suggestion of returning to the old system is credible.

Peter Soulsby: I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention, which gives me an opportunity to re-emphasise that I am not seeking a return to the system as we used to know it. I envisage a system with a much reduced number of committees and an enhanced central committee, be it called a policy and resources committee or a policy committee, that is clearly in control of the overall direction of the authority, with perhaps a limited number of sub-committees reporting to it. Such an arrangement would enable a local authority to have both the leadership role whose importance we have stressed and the accountability that is made possible by members debating across a table the direction of the authority’s policy.
To conclude, I am arguing that there should be a wider range of choices than is included in the Bill. I do not support the amendments, because there are a number of arbitrary elements to them, as the hon. Member for Hazel Grove acknowledged, which make them unsatisfactory. I hope that the Government will recognise that it would benefit good local government if there were a wider range of choices of governance than is currently offered. I hope that the Minister will agree to reconsider the proposals and recognise that the range to be offered is too limited and prescriptiveto local government. We have an opportunity to allow local government greater freedom in how it responds to local circumstances, to the local political environment and to local communities.

Bob Neill: I want to pick up where the hon. Member for Leicester, South left off. I agree with him and I commend much of what he said to Ministers. His experience as a former leader of a large local authority should weigh heavily with them, especially given the Minister’s comment when he intervened on an observation by my hon. Friend the Member for North-East Bedfordshire who said in the context of the Gordon Keymer scenario that the key test is contrasting a well run authority, whatever its structure, with a badly run authority. As my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, Southgate said, we should not work on the assumption that the committee system can work only in small authorities. There is no reason why it should not be applied in large local authorities in its enhanced form.
The point was made about clear political leadership and we all sign up to that. There was never a larger local authority in English history than, first, the London county council and then the Greater London council, nor were there local authorities with a stronger tradition of clear political leadership and direction. Herbert Morrison was as strong a local government leader as one could find operating under the old committee system, so were Ike Hayward, Desmond Plummer, Horace Cutler and—dare I say it— Ken Livingstone.
All those people gave very clear political leadership and direction to their authorities under the old committee system, never mind the modernised and enhanced one which, I agree with the hon. Member for Leicester, South, should be an option. If it could work then, why cannot it work now? Does it not come back to the quality and calibre of the politicians and the senior officers?
My experience chimes with that of my hon. Friends and others. If we want to keep good quality people in local government, they have to think that there is a worthwhile role for them. I do not denigrate scrutiny and I take the point, but if people believe that the only time that they will be able to take a decision and make a difference in a substantial and meaningful way is by waiting to become a member of the executive, it will put a lot of very good people off—hence the turnover, which is a real concern.
Some local authorities try to get around the problem because they want to be involved in scrutiny but a good council wants to be involved in policy development too. In Bromley, we call our scrutiny committees policy development scrutiny committees, which is an attempt to get members involved at an earlier stage. We could do that in the context of the leader and cabinet system and of the enhanced committee system too.
As I said, I spent 16 years as a member of a London borough council and for eight of those years I was chairman of one of the large service committees—first the environment committee and then the social services committee. It was under the old structure, but we gave a pretty clear political steer. We had a leader, who chaired the policy and resources committee; the chairmen of the five or six service committees were on the policy and resources committee and the opposition were also represented on it.
We had a system of delegation that enabled urgent decisions to be taken and we should look again at the legal problems that sometimes get in the way in that respect. We made sure that members—usually the chairman or the vice-chairman of the committee—were involved if urgent action had to be taken,. We also had a system whereby the leader and the service committee chairmen could meet senior officers and give them a steer, or direction.
The point is well made that, in the policy resources committee, not only could the opposition debate the issue and question the officers on their recommendations, but the officers had to account for them. That worked in a very large local authority—London boroughs were almost the same size as the city of Leicester, for example—and it worked on a bigger scale for the London county council and the Greater London council, so I do not understand why we are closing that option off.
I say to the Minister that there is a contrast between the Government’s approach to this clause and to the previous one. If we accept that the option can work for small local authorities, why close it off arbitrarily for larger local authorities? Would not the decentralising, localist option be to leave it open for all classes of local authority and, as the Minister said earlier, let them decide?

Andrew Gwynne: I rise to offer my comments on this part of the Bill, on which we have had an interesting debate.
Only the first two of my 11 years as a local councillor—between 1996 and 1998—were spent under the old committee system. So my experience of the old system is very limited. I grew up politically with the new cabinet system and its birth pains when first introduced. However, I must say from my two years’ experience that I think that we tend to hark back to a golden age that never existed. That was not my recollection of how the committee system worked. Members certainly felt more involved; that is correct. They had all the reports and tended to discuss issues with other members on different committees in the members’ room or at other meetings. Therefore, they had a general overview of what was happening in the council that perhaps they do not have now.
 In my experience on the committee, however, decisions were made at the chairs’ briefing, which were bounced through the group meeting, sometimes with a row behind closed doors. Nevertheless they were bounced through and were rubber-stamped at the committee meeting open to the public and opposition often under the hard stare of the whips if there had been a row in the group meeting. I am all too familiar with hard stares from Whips, because I have been told to be brief. However, that was my experience of the old committee system.
The new system was undoubtedly a culture shock for those who had lived with the old one for a number of years. They had become familiar with it. It was very comfortable. The new one has taken time to bed down and in some authorities it is still not there. But where it is working, scrutiny and support for members not in the cabinet is certainly in place and working well. I take the point of the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst about pre-decision scrutiny. When I was a scrutiny chair in Tameside, we took the decision to lead the way on scrutiny in our borough. Afterwards, it was perceived to be a success and the executive asked us to do more of it. So where it works, it works well. However, I accept that it has taken time to bed down.
 I shall turn to the information, which is there. Any councillor can ask for the background information to a cabinet decision in advance of it being taken. Information on the officers, who to contact and so on is all there in the forward plan. Certainly in Tameside—although it might be different in other authorities—the forward plan is debated at full council so there is the opportunity for all members, including back-bench members in the controlling group and all opposition members, to debate issues before the cabinet makes a decision.
Finally, I shall turn to amendment No. 99 tabled by the Liberal Democrats. I accept that the hon. Member for Hazel Grove said that the upper limit of 850,000 was arbitrary, but if it is right that some metropolitan district councils, which are currently prevented from having a streamlined committee system, should adopt one, it should be available to all of them. It should not be discriminatory. Of course, setting the target at 850,000 would mean that 35 out of the 36 metropolitan district councils in England could opt for the committee system—poor Birmingham would be left out. So if someone is going to argue that it is right for metropolitan councils to have that facility, it should be for all of them, and not all except Birmingham.

Philip Dunne: I, too, do not wish to detain the Committee, but to make one point. I rise in support of the amendment in the name of the hon. Member for Hazel Grove. The point that has just been made is a telling one, however, and I hope that he will comment on it before he presses the amendment, if he chooses to do so.
We are looking at rearranging certain local government structures on a unitary basis, which means that a very many councillors will be participating in a new structure for the first time. In my view, it is likely that a number of councillors will not have participated nor had previous experience of either structure. I am delighted to have the opportunity to mention the possible restructuring in Shropshire where, as I told the Minister last night, we are possibly looking at a council of 96 councillors. One has to ask oneself what all those people are going to do in a council of that size that does not have any committee structure other than for overview and scrutiny. How are they going to get engaged and participate in decision making?
The points that have been made by other hon. Members are valid, so I shall not rehearse them—councillors will have a lack of opportunity to develop and grow and to participate in debate. So it is entirely appropriate to have a committee structure option on a hybrid basis.

Phil Woolas: The debate is important, and it is being echoed in council chambers, in members’ rooms and in the wider local government family, so it is important that the Government present the arguments clearly. I hope to persuade the Committee that the ideas on which the amendment is based are ill-founded and would not achieve what the mover of the amendment intended.
I hope that I have already explained in our debates on previous clauses the Government’s intention and thinking in relation to the executive arrangements that we have proposed. However, let me repeat one point for emphasis. If one is truly ambitious for local government, one believes that local government can take up a strategic leadership role and a delivery role across the range of services, across the portfolio of economic regeneration of an area, across crime and disorder partnerships, across the children and young people’s agenda and the health and elderly people’s agenda. However, even medium-sized local authorities are being asked to give strategic direction over hundreds and hundreds of millions of pounds of public money, so the limit on the Government’s willingness to devolve power is that we can do so only when we are convinced that decision-making arrangements are in place by which responsibility for such matters can be taken. If people wish to portray that as an anti-devolutionary or centralist policy, I will have to live with that, but we are debating the subject of the barriers to devolution. The hon. Member for Hazel Grove takes an entirely consistent position—that councils should decide, but I want to persuade him that that is not in their interests.
Several hon. Members have said that strong leaders existed under the old system. That is true—I said it of the mayoral model in New York. My argument is not that strong leadership follows necessarily from an executive arrangement, or that an alternative arrangement cannot produce a strong leader. I think that strong leaders come out of strong political parties and a healthy body politic, which I think all of us have an interest in fostering. My argument is rather that the Government’s proposals are more likely to lead to strong and accountable leadership and are more likely to be fit for purpose for the new responsibilities and the extra powers that we intend to give to local authorities. 
On Second Reading, the hon. Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Mr. Pickles) said that if one is serious about devolution, one has to talk about money, because power flows from it. It is precisely because we are serious about devolving power over public money that one has to have confidence in the executive arrangements.
 I have referred often to the 2000 Act, which we are building on by way of the Bill. That Act provided the types of executive arrangements, and separated the role of back-bench councillor from the executive councillors. As we are doing now, the Government took a devolutionary and pragmatic approach in 2000. That is the answer to the points made by the hon. Member for Enfield, Southgate, who asked why there should be smaller councils. Ultimately, the figure of 85,000 for population—it is population that counts, not the electorate—is an arbitrary one. The cut-off date was 30 June 1999. If an area had a population of fewer than 85,000, it could adopt what were referred to as alternative arrangements, also known as the committee structure. In the event, of the 86 eligible authorities, 59 adopted the alternative approach. Since then, three authorities—Cotswold, Fylde and Rossendale—have moved from alternative arrangements to executive arrangements, and have adopted a leader and a cabinet. I have looked in vain for a common thread between them but I could not find one.
The 2000 Act also provided for alternative arrangements as a fall-back position in case of a no vote in a mayoral referendum. That is the situation in Brighton and Hove, and I know that it will listen closely to this debate. But—and this is where we come to the core of the argument—the amendments would not allow the enhanced committee function to which my hon. Friend the Member for Leicester, South referred. Indeed, under the existing arrangements, it is possible for an executive to devolve executive powers to sub-areas. That is an important part of the devolutionary approach and of involving people and bringing them closer to their local authorities. An executive can already devolve executive powers by area.
In other authorities—the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst mentioned his own—the role of overview and scrutiny involves policy development and what are commonly called task and finish groups, through which recommendations can be made not just about traditional areas of council activity but about the wider activity of the area, the local authority and its partners. That is the nub of it.
I shall comment on the rose-tinted glasses that my younger colleague the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish mentioned, but the old internal decision-making committee structure, whatever its strengths and weaknesses, was a decision-making structure for the council as an institution and not for the area as a whole. It would not be able to take responsibility for the strategic direction of health, crime and disorder and children and young people, never mind social care or other responsibilities. One should see decision-making executive structures in the context of the wider, enhanced role that we are increasingly inviting local authorities to take. I think that that answers the point, because smaller areas do not take on the responsibilities.
A number of other points were made, which I shall try to answer. The hon. Member for Ludlow asked what the other councillors should do, as those who are not on the executive can feel excluded from decision making. It is precisely because councillors across the political spectrum too often spend more time in committees in the town, city or county hall—or, to be fair, in districts—and not as champions of their wards that we are in a situation in which too many councils have become distant.
The new functions that I have mentioned of overview and scrutiny and of policy development and reports across the whole range of services provide a fantastic opportunity for local authority back-benchers to be involved in decision making. Indeed, if one attends the overview and scrutiny committee, which is now a major annual event in the calendar of local government, there is excitement and a buzz about the potential role of overview and scrutiny.
I endorse strongly the point that my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish made. Inadvertently, the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst backed up his point when he mentioned a policy and resource committee made up of the deputy leader and chairs of the committees. What is that if not an executive by another name?

Peter Soulsby: It is precisely right to liken that to a camel. The difference, however, is that opposition members were able to question directly both the executive and the officers on the thinking behind their recommendations to the committee. Surely, that was its great strength—and that is lacking in the cabinet system.

Phil Woolas: I disagree with my hon. Friend on two counts. First, a functioning overview and scrutiny committee allows such questioning to be carried out in a way that is similar to the process in the House, although I would not take the analogy too far. Secondly, and more importantly, the public did not know what the policy and resources committee was. Because of the local government decision-making process that existed, the chairs of the committee took decisions, often in private, often involving two or three people and often not in the council building. The hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst looks perplexed, but he cannot, with his experience of local government, believe that Herbert Morrison took his decisions openly in committees in every instance and debated them and did not have a preconceived idea of what he wanted.

Bob Neill: I am perplexed about the Minister thinking that Londoners do not know who Herbert Morrison was. That surprised me.

Phil Woolas: If I did not know who Herbert Morrison was before I arrived in London, his grandson certainly taught me about him. I invite the hon. Gentleman to name one other chair of the committee from the London county council at the time of Herbert Morrison. Unless he is a complete local government anorak, which he is not, he will not be able to do so.

Bob Neill: Freda Corbett.

Phil Woolas: The legendary Freda Corbett is called in aid of an argument to return to the committee system. At least the hon. Gentleman is a conservative with a small ‘c’. I commend him for wanting to go backwards.
 In answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Leicester, South, there is a serious point to be made about accountability and visibility. The amendment does not take us back, as he says, to the old committee system. Nobody has spoken in favour of the old committee system, which leaves we Committee members with the difficulty of not having a definition of what an enhanced committee is. I believe strongly that those councils that have grasped the executive arrangements and the overview and scrutiny opportunities are already finding ways to involve newer, and often younger, members in the decision-making process—Tameside is a good example—and are getting the benefits of that strong, speedier decision making.
I think that I have answered the points that have been made, if not to the satisfaction of hon. Members.

John Pugh: The Minister made some pertinent, relevant assertions, including that cabinet members are far more visible than committee chairs ever were and that there is enthusiasm throughout the land for scrutiny and overview. Those are contestable assertions. It would be sensible to do some polling or evidence-based research to justify those claims and find out whether cabinet members were any better known to their local communities than committee chairs were and whether there is enthusiasm among back-bench councillors. The evidence is probably to the contrary, but has his Department commissioned any research to find out whether the Minister is right?

Phil Woolas: The hon. Gentleman asks a legitimate question. I have mentioned some of the surveys relating to this matter. Of course, the Department has taken up such research, as has the Improvement and Development Agency, the Leadership Centre for Local Government and, I think, the Local Government Association. One has to test the whole circumstance, including the overview and scrutiny and the executive arrangements. My real evidence is in the improvement of performance of local authorities. There is a correlation, which the research tends to show, between better executive decision-making structures and the enhanced performance of local government. I could throw in the 39 per cent. real-terms increase in grant as well, but Mr. Benton might accuse me of point scoring. I am not saying that there is always, necessarily cause-and-effect between the two things. I concede the point that the hon. Gentleman made reasonably. Strong leaders can emerge under any structure, but I am concerned with what is most likely to achieve that objective.

David Burrowes: I am struggling to understand the Minister’s logic when distinguishing between those smaller councils that have alternative arrangements and the larger councils. He suggests that councils with a population under 85,000 do not necessarily involve themselves in strategic issues. I question that, and I am sure that those authorities would question whether he is right that they are not involved in strategic issues about children and young people, crime and disorder and social care. They fundamentally are, and they would question and challenge the idea that they do not have a role to play in the strategic leadership of their local authority just because they are smaller.
Is it not true that the Minister is more worried about the budget and how much central money councils have to deal with? One answer would be to make them fully accountable and autonomous and to make them raise their own revenue. The other option would be to have a cut-off link of 85,000 based not on numerical population, but on the budget that it receives.

Phil Woolas: The hon. Gentleman tempts me down the road of the other clauses on finances and on money-raising powers. If he will forgive me, I shall resist.
I said that, to some extent, the 85,000 figure was arbitrary. The hon. Gentleman rightly says that it is based on population not on electorate. All such councils, with the exception of one, are lower tier authorities. They are not involved in the big strategic issues to which I referred, although they are involved increasingly through enhanced two-tier working and under the auspices of the local area agreement. It boils down to a pragmatic approach. The one exception is the county of Rutland, re-created by a former Prime Minister out of—probably worthy—nostalgia. Rutland certainly has not asked for executive arrangements.
I concede to the Committee that the question is where one draws the boundary and how far one involves executive arrangements. I recognise that point, but it is right that the Government, and indeed, Parliament should draw the line at some point. Otherwise chaos would ensue.
The amendment that the hon. Member for Hazel Grove has tabled would not achieve what he wants, and that is because of the way in which it is written. Crucially, it would not achieve what my hon. Friend the Member for Leicester, South would like. What it describes as the enhanced committee structure can be achieved under existing executive arrangements in the 2000 Act. If I have the opportunity, I shall put into context those arrangements, particularly the points about Brighton and Hove, which is I imagine waiting with bated breath to find out how it fits into the clause. On that point, I ask the hon. Gentleman to withdraw his amendment.

Andrew Stunell: I said at the beginning that the clause is six-and-a-half pages long. Perhaps I made it more difficult for hon. Members by offering three different options, but some criticism of the amendments did not, perhaps understandably, appreciate that.
As I said, amendment No. 34 would effectively provide all councils with the self-rule option; amendment No. 100 would provide self-rule to all district and metropolitan councils; and amendment No. 99 would provide self-rule to all councils of any shape with a population of up to 850,000. They were options, and perhaps if I had focused on just one, we might have had a slightly different debate, although then no doubt the criticism would have been that I had not taken account of other options.
I started by saying that I should like the Minister to come out of his centralist mindset, seeing as he has talked to the rest of us about doing so, and I am disappointed that he has not. The debate has brought out some accurate points. It is certainly true that my amendment does not define an enhanced committee system, but if close definition of the outcome had been intended in the Bill, we might have expected from the Government a little more precision on the directly elected executive. Given the response to the last debate, a lack of precision should not be a reason for ruling such a system out.
The Minister set aside 100 years of local government performance—until at least 1948, although we could take it further forward—when local authorities in places such as Birmingham, which has been mentioned, and Manchester were controlling utilities, transport and health as well as all the services that they now control. They did that using the committee system and, on the whole, they did it well.
I am disappointed by the Minister’s response. He recognised that the debate is important and crucial, but unfortunately he has come down on the wrong side of it. Once again, he has raised the red herring that there is some connection between performance or outcomes and the governance system. In a previous debate, I think I heard him accept that there was no connection; that is certainly the view of the Audit Commission, which believes that there is no connection between the governance system and outputs and outcomes.
 Mr. Woolas rose—

Andrew Stunell: I shall be happy to give way to the Minister, but just now he seemed to resile from what he had conceded in the previous debate and to be saying that there was a difference in performance.

Phil Woolas: I said that there was no necessary cause and effect and that it was, in my view, more likely that stronger executive arrangements would lead to enhanced performance. That is the view that the Department’s research has backed up. It is also a common-sense view, given the increase in the performance of local authorities as measured by the Audit Commission over that period.

Andrew Stunell: Perhaps we need to discuss this in some other place, but my understanding is that the Audit Commission is clear that when it looks at its ratings and comprehensive performance assessments, it cannot detect any difference in the performances of authorities based on their existing leadership model. That includes those with the alternative arrangements. They are neither noticeably worse nor noticeably better, and the same can be said for each of the categories. If the Minister wants to say that the Audit Commission has got that wrong or that I am misinterpreting what its data show, perhaps he will have another opportunity to put his point.

Alistair Burt: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the debate has been characterised by the Minister’s giving good reasons why he does not prefer that particular model? He would prefer a choice of others. However, he has not given a good reason why the choice should not be there for authorities to take if they wish.

Andrew Stunell: Absolutely. I thought that having given the Minister, in my big-hearted way, three possible options to pick, he might at least indicate that one or another might be slightly preferable to him. However, he has not chosen to do so. I do not intend to detain the Committee a great deal longer, but I want to press amendment No. 34 to a Division.

Joe Benton: Let us deal first with amendment No. 33.

Amendment negatived..

Amendment proposed: No. 34, in clause 41, page 24, leave out lines 19 to 31 and insert—
 ‘(2) Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 33A and 33B, any principal council may submit a scheme of internal governance appropriate to its circumstances which shall stand deferred until the next election to the council.
(3) Where no recognised group has overall control, it shall be competent for the council to implement other arrangements as it may determine.’. —[Andrew Stunell.]

Question put, That the amendment be made:—

The Committee divided: Ayes 7, Noes 11.

Question accordingly negatived.

Andrew Stunell: I beg to move amendment No. 37, in clause 41, page 25, line 12, leave out from ‘must’ to end of line 14 and insert
‘hold a referendum of local government electors in the authority’s area.’.

Joe Benton: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments: No. 42, in clause 41, page 27, line 32, leave out from beginning to end of line 9 on page 28.
No. 44, in clause 41, page 28, leave out lines 16 to 26.
No. 46, in clause 42, page 30, line 30, leave out subsection (3).

Andrew Stunell: I seem to be having a good innings this afternoon, but I will leave you in peace later on, Mr. Benton.
The amendment gives the Minister his second opportunity to come out of his centralist mindset in relation to the requirement for a referendum before a mayoral system can be introduced. The clause removes that requirement, but the intention of the amendment is to restore it. Again, the debate was rehearsed to some extent on Second Reading. There have been 32 mayoral referendums, but only 12 of those have been successful, in the sense that they have approved a mayor, while 20 have been unsuccessful. In the cases of four of the 12 successful referendums, there are vigorous campaigns to get rid of the mayor. The Minister said on Second Reading that it is of course possible to get rid of a mayor, which led me to have a careful look at the wording. It is indeed possible to do that, but only provided that the mayor agrees, because the council has to sign off any such change.
That is the current situation. Whatever the merits of the mayoral system, at least this completely novel form of local government required endorsement by the public before it was put in place. As the Library note states, Lord Hattersley has said:
“Originally the idea of switching from a proper council to an elected mayor had to be endorsed by the local people...But the rules have been revised. If a local authority wants to hand over its responsibilities to one individual supported by anonymous councillors with emasculated powers, it is now free to do so. The obligation to organise a referendum has been scrapped. Too many referendums produce the wrong result. That decision was, we must hope, the death throes of New Labour’s novel definition of local democracy—the right of the people to choose as long as they make the choice that the government wants.”
I could hardly have put it better myself.
It is extremely difficult to see any decentralising or empowering tendency at work. Local people, who have so far said by two to one that they do not want mayoral systems, will not be given the chance to choose, as it will be for councils to decide. I want to hear the Government’s answer to the criticism that they are proceeding simply in order to force through more mayors in the face of popular dissent. The facts are very clear. There is no need for me to go on any longer, but if the Minister would like to comment in passing on the way in which proposed new section 33N would be used to get rid of a mayor under the present system, I would be interested to hear his explanation.

Phil Woolas: Thank you, Mr. Benton. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Hazel Grove for tabling the amendment and giving us the opportunity to debate this issue. The first premise of his speech, and of the amendment, is that the Government want more local authorities to take up the mayoral model, but that is not our policy. Our policy is that local authorities should have strong executive arrangements and that it should be up to them to decide whether they are within the boundaries that we have debated today.
 Neither the Government nor I see what the hon. Gentleman described as the loss of a referendum as a defeat. It is good that some local authorities have taken up referendums. When the result has been against the mayoral model, it has helped to enhance the democratic process and to reconnect the local authority with the people. To think that that is the Government’s objective is to misunderstand what we are trying to achieve in prompting the debate about executive arrangements. We do not prompt the debate about mayors in order to impose—via the front door, back door or a side door—a mayoral model. It is evident from our policy decisions and debates that that is not the case. We are saying to local authorities, “We want you to have more power, but we want you to have in place the arrangements that would best suit that purpose.”
At the heart of the debate is the hon. Gentleman’s second premise, on which we differ, although it is an honourable difference. When he moved the amendment, he said that there should be a requirement to hold a referendum. In other words, were the amendment to be passed, we in central Government and Parliament would tell a council what it had to do in such circumstances. There is a similar debate on the unitary proposals. We are not saying to councils what the public test has to be. If one is a devolutionist, one has to trust the council. I imagine that if a council were to resolve to move to a mayoral model and that model was unpopular in the area, the public would have their say at the ballot box—indeed, I am certain that that would be the case. Therefore, the premise on which the hon. Gentleman has based his case is not where the Government are coming from. There may be, or may have been, people in the Government who thought that it would be a good idea to have mayors everywhere and to impose their introduction, but that is not Government policy.

Andrew Stunell: The Minister has, to some extent, pre-empted me, but the Prime Minister is not yet a former post holder. The Prime Minister seemed extremely keen on this form of government. Indeed, it has been suggested that that might be why the measure was first introduced.

Phil Woolas: Again, I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. There is a danger in politics that the Opposition believe their own propaganda too much. Our manifesto makes our intention very clear. The prompting of the debate about mayors is not so that the Government can impose their favourite model, but to ensure that there is debate about executive arrangements.
The hon. Gentleman has taken a perfectly consistent position, and I commend him on it. He has said that the decision should be by referendum, and it will still be possible under the Bill for the public to petition for a referendum. Also, executive arrangements that have been determined by referendum may be changed only by another referendum. The clause adds to our manifesto commitment that local authorities should be able to make that choice, which is why we reject the notion put forward in the hon. Gentleman’s amendment.
The hon. Gentleman asked me specifically about proposed new section 33N to the Local Government Act 2000, which is set out in clause 41 of this Bill. It ensures that changes to the governance arrangements of mayor and cabinet executive or elected executive—he would not like to see those, but in such circumstances, this would apply—cannot be made without the specific consent of the elected mayor or the elected executive leader, both of whom have a direct mandate from the electorate of the whole council area. 
The effect of the hon. Gentleman’s amendment would be to enable an authority to make changes to its constitution, such as changes to the allocation of responsibility for functions between the full council and the executive, without needing to ensure beforehand that the executive was content with that. That would undermine the accountability of the executive. Those are the reasons why I reject the point of view that the hon. Gentleman has put forward.

Philip Dunne: Will the Minister clarify whether proposed new section 33N(2) would mean that if an elected mayor or leader lost a motion of confidence in his own performance, he could thereby prevent the change in structure and keep himself in post?

Phil Woolas: A directly elected leader, be they a mayor or an executive under the arrangements that we were discussing, can be removed only by the electorate, unless criminal or other such activity is involved—similarly, a Member of Parliament is elected for a period of office. We are saying that an indirectly elected leader would be elected by the full council for a period of four years, unless they lose the confidence of the council, which would be expressed, as happens now, through a resolution. Our intention is minor, but it is symbolically important.
 At the moment, a council leader faces re-election by the full council every year. That normally happens at the annual general meeting on the Saturday following local elections, although it sometimes occurs in the following week. In practice, where there is majority control the decision is made by the majority group. Where there is no overall control, which is the case in a significant number of councils, that is subject to the arrangements. The council leader needs re-endorsement each year.
Under this proposal, the constitution of the council would assume that the leader would stay in office for four years, unless there is a motion of no confidence in them at any council meeting, so the presumption is the other way round.

Andrew Stunell: That would move towards the old Scottish system of a four-year convenorship, as opposed to having one-year leadership. Does the Minister intend or recognise that that will simply be bypassed in real life by the way in which we do things in England? Will he be a little more explicit about why he thinks that we need this provision rather than just leaving things as they are?

Phil Woolas: The hon. Gentleman has made a good point. Because of the process of dividing the role of the executive from the role of back-bench overview and scrutiny, the council as a corporate body requires its executive power to be accountable, and the presumption of leadership for four years enhances that. I admit that that is more symbolic than practical in the real world, and some local authority leaders have said that they would prefer an annual endorsement as part of their strong leadership, which is a reasonable point of view. To answer the hon. Gentleman’s question directly, placing that executive power in the office of the leader will enhance accountability and the council’s ability—let alone its leader’s ability—to implement its strategic objectives with its partners.

Andrew Stunell: I very much appreciate the Minister’s generosity in giving way. I want to take him on to a different issue: will he confirm the point in the Library briefing that the only way to change an existing electoral mayoral system is if the existing elected mayor agrees to it under proposed new section 33N(2)(a)? That seems to be the model.

Phil Woolas: Let me explain again the principle behind the policy that we are pursuing, as laid out in the Bill. The route by which an executive arrangement has been made is the route by which it can be undone. Of course, some stability for that must be built in and an elected mayor can resign or face other circumstances that would render him or her incapable of holding the office. In the absence of that—this is the case in Stoke-on-Trent—the elected mayor, who was elected directly by the population and whose office was created by the referendum, must stay in office until the end of the period.

Andrew Stunell: May I press the Minister on that point? Proposed new section 33N is apparently a clear statement that a proposal to change governance arrangements cannot be implemented unless the elected mayor has given written consent to the proposed change. In the event of a campaign against a mayor or popular consent against a mayor, he or she is entrenched unless they sign something according to that provision. Will the Minister tell me whether that is correct?

Phil Woolas: The hon. Gentleman slightly misunderstands what proposed new section 33N does. It does not apply to changing the model of governance, which is not what it refers to. The hon. Gentleman has quoted proposed new section 33N(1), which is not about changing the model of governance.

Andrew Stunell: Perhaps this is a matter to take up outside the Committee. However, the fact is that according to the Library note and my reading of proposed new section 33N(2)(a), the mayor cannot be dislodged and a new system cannot be proposed by the council unless the mayor gives assent to that.

Amendment negatived.

Clause 41 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 42 and 43 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 44

Elected executives

Andrew Stunell: I beg to move amendment No. 105, in clause 44, page 31, line 25, at end insert—
‘(5A) Such termination shall not take place until the end of a period of three months after the elected leader ceases to hold office or until the election of a new elected executive, whichever is the sooner.’.
The amendment relates to what happens when the leader steps down. The Bill provides that when the leader steps down the entire executive falls with him. I said in an earlier debate that if the leader was to go under a bus today, with the budget being in three weeks’ time, it would be somewhat inconvenient. If, in an election year, the leader were knocked down by a bus on 11 November and were due to retire from the council the following May, under the six-month rule—

Sitting suspended for a Division in the House.

On resuming—

Andrew Stunell: I realised during the Division that I am trying to improve the unimprovable. Therefore, I would like to hear why the Minister feels that amendment No. 105—and in due course amendment No. 106—should not be accepted by the Committee, bearing in mind that his scheme will be totally unworkable unless he does.

Phil Woolas: The passion of the hon. Gentleman’s campaign against directly elected executives continues to grow. I will defend the Government’s proposals and the schemes of my colleagues in Stockton and elsewhere.
In tabling the amendment, I think that the hon. Gentleman is trying to provide greater stability for the council that has adopted the directly elected executive model so that, if the elected leader ceases to hold office during the four years, for whatever reason, there can be stability and the remainder of the executive can carry on. The Government are keen to support stability in councils so, on the face of it, it would seem that I should accept the hon. Gentleman’s amendment. However, I have to resist it. I shall explain why
The Committee knows that the Government’s view is that directly elected forms of executive arrangements provide the strongest and most visible leadership and are therefore the most accountable. As with a mayor, a directly elected executive allows people to understand who is responsible for taking difficult decisions—in other words, they know where the buck stops. People would elect a directly elected executive on the basis of the manifesto that has been produced and, of course, they can hold that executive to account. However, under that system they expressly elect a leader and members of the executive. When they cast their vote they are choosing the person—the executive leader—whom they want to be in charge of delivering a manifesto and policies with the help of the executive members on his or her slate, if I can use that word.
The executive powers of the council rest in the office of the leader in those circumstances as in the other two options, and it is therefore essential that if that person ceases to hold office, the electorate are able to choose whom they wish to replace that leader. Of course, that would result in a by-election, and I suspect that it is part of the hon. Gentleman’s concerns about this model. However, I think that that is right. If the electorate have chosen an executive with a leader, and that leader resigns or leaves office for some reason, they should be able to choose a successor. That is a good thing and it will help to achieve the improvement of local democracy that we all say we want.
The provisions relating to the filling of casual vacancies occurring in the office of the elected mayor are contained in regulations; they were not included in the 2000 Act. Broadly, those regulations state that an election to fill the vacancy shall be held within 35 working days of the date that the office was declared vacant. Until such an election has taken place and the vacancy has been filled, the office is filled by the deputy mayor. Therefore, it would be inconsistent to include in the Bill the arrangements for such by-elections; to remain consistent, such provisions should be contained in regulations in order.
I would like to reassure the Committee, and take the opportunity to place on record, that we intend to provide for the filling of vacancies in the office of the leader of the directly elected executive in exactly the same way that is used for the office of mayor. Where there is a vacancy for the office of leader of an elected executive, an election for a new executive would have to take place within 35 days of the date that the office was declared vacant. That would be an election for a new leader and a slate of candidates. Until such an election had taken place and the new executive had taken office, we would intend to provide for the old executive, led by the deputy leader, to continue. Requiring the election of a new leader and executive within 35 days provides the stability required in an authority and, crucially, the transparency and accountability that I hope we all want to achieve. That is my explanation of how to make a workable proposal even more workable.

Andrew Stunell: It is always good to see Houdini in fine form. I understand the points that the Minister has made. I am pleased to hear that there will be suitable regulations. I am sorry that they are not to be in the Bill, but I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Andrew Stunell: I beg to move amendment No. 107, in clause 44, page 31, leave out lines 35 and 36 and insert—
‘( ) The number of members of the executive which is to be elected shall be the number of persons included on the proposed executive that is declared elected, but that number shall not exceed 12.’.
I alluded to this amendment before. It deals with the question whether the Minister has a fixed determination that a set size of slate should be put before the electorate when the directly elected model is used, or whether he would prefer the approach that the Liberal Democrats see as right, which is that that, too, could be a matter for competition between the competing teams who seek to run the authority, and that the legislation should therefore allow for the executive being of the size of the winning slate, provided that it is not above a fixed number. We have said 12, but the Minister might prefer 10 as the cut-off number. It is a straightforward matter. Would it not be right to give the council and the electorate the right to choose the size of the executive team that they have, as well as their political and other composition?

Phil Woolas: I again congratulate the hon. Gentleman on his amendment, because councils that may be looking to adopt different models would wish to know about these important matters. My own point of view was influenced significantly by discussions with county council leaders of different political groupings who pointed out the geography of county councils and the distances that members had to travel. In one case, the chair of the county council has to do a 120-mile round trip to chair a meeting of the council or, indeed, a sub-committee of it. It was felt that it would be better to have directly elected members who could carry out functions in the administration, as well as the ward or division councillors who could concentrate on their patch and travel less frequently. There are other arguments in favour, and I do not dismiss those arguments. It is important that we have that flexibility.
That brings us to the hon. Gentleman’s interesting suggestion, which, if I understood him correctly, would allow competing slates to be of different sizes and give councils greater flexibility. Of course, one would have some flexibility. If a group wanted to have an executive slate of 10 including the leader, and in fact to give a portfolio only to four or five of those, that would be possible under the arrangement. We have already debated the wider issues behind directly elected executives and I have not convinced the hon. Gentleman that the proposal is desirable and workable. I will keep trying, but not for too long.
 Clause 39 sets out our intention to extend to elected executives the current provisions that determine the maximum and minimum number of executives for mayoral or leader and cabinet models. That means that elected executives will, including the leader, contain a minimum of three members and a maximum of 10 members. The number of executive members that a council has is set out in its constitution and is determined by the full council. In determining the number of executive members, councils should have regard to certain factors, including the need to exercise their functions and the size of the council. The number of candidates on a slate will therefore be identical to the number of executives set out in the council’s constitution, which will have been subject to the consideration of the full council. We have put the cart before the horse, in other words.

Andrew Stunell: I am sure that the Minister can easily envisage circumstances in which an opposition group might say that it had a different way of running the council, with a different number of executives, with different departmental allocations, and that that might be part of a legitimate—indeed, perhaps essential—theme of value for money or some other argument that they would wish to deploy. However, they would be trapped by a prior decision to have an executive of a certain size. I wonder whether the Minister would consider that situation.

Phil Woolas: I confess to the Committee—I hope that my Whip will not make a note of this—that I debated this issue with the Liberal Democrat leader of a county council late one night in a restaurant somewhere in south-west England. The argument that I made then was as follows. The full council takes the decision on what model it will use. The full council takes that decision before the electorate have chosen which political colour of slate they want to run the council. In doing so, the council cannot pre-empt the decision of the electorate. Therefore, the number of people on the elected executive and what resolution the council forms in setting up that executive will, of course, come before the people have had their say. The executive’s obligation, therefore, is to include in the number of the directly elected executive members the equivalent number to that which would be in the cabinet of the leader, or indeed hypothetically the mayor, paying regard to the functions, the geography of the place and so on.
In practice, if a slate did not want to adopt that full role and wanted to change those functions, it would have to justify that to the council in the first instance. However, it would be wrong to allow a council to pre-empt the decision of the electorate by changing the constitution in such a way that a fair comparison could not be made. That was the conclusion of the late-night debate in a hotel in south-west England.

Andrew Stunell: Again I am disappointed by the Minister’s answer, because under the amendment the council would not be pre-empting the electorate’s decision; on the contrary, under his system, the council will be pre-empting that decision. It will decide whether to have eight, 10, or whatever the number might be of members, and it will have a constitution that is approved. Under the system proposed in the Liberal Democrat amendment, the council would not be pre-empting the electorate’s decision and it would be for those who contested the executive election to put forward a slate that they thought was appropriate to the circumstances of that council. Under the system that I am proposing, far from the council pre-empting the electorate’s decision, the situation would be exactly the opposite. However, it is clear that the haze has not yet cleared from that late-night hotel session and therefore I will not press the amendment today. I hope that wiser counsel will prevail in the ministerial office in due course. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

Philip Dunne: I would like to ask the Minister a question about the clause. My concern arises from the fact that the Minister envisages a slate of people being elected under the proposed system. One has to assume that many of those people will have been councillors, because they are the people who are most likely to wish to take executive roles with the authority, and that within a month or thereabouts there would have to be a by-election for all those members of the slate who have been elected as leaders of the council. Does the Minister envisage that that will lead to greater public participation in local elections, or to less? The only example that I am aware of in recent years of an election taking place shortly after a another election in which turnout rose was the case of my good friend and neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for South Staffordshire (Sir Patrick Cormack). In that election, the turnout soared shortly after the general election in very peculiar circumstances.
When there are by-elections shortly after an all-out election, surely the turnout will be greatly reduced, which will lead to increasing apathy among the local electorate for local elections. In any event, it is a challenge for all those involved in local elections to encourage turnout. Does the Minister have any examples of any authority anywhere in the world where a similar system applies? It would be useful for the Committee to know that.

Phil Woolas: I thank the hon. Gentleman for raising a serious point about the by-election process that could result from this directly elected model. I thank him for giving me the opportunity to repeat my comments to The Daily Telegraph last week when I learned with great regret that despite the increased turnout at the election, the Conservative party have ignored the advice of the electorate in that part of the world and have tried to deselect the hon. Gentleman. I said that it was a terrible day for Parliament when hon. Members—

Joe Benton: Order Could I ask the Minister to come back to the point?

Phil Woolas: Thank you Mr. Benton. I think you put it more politely than my Whip was about to do. I have now completely forgotten the question that I was asked. It was about by-elections. In our model, if an individual stood both as a ward councillor and as a member of the slate, he or she would risk winning and losing. In the event of winning the executive election, they would have to resign the ward election and in the event of losing they would, if elected at ward level, carry on in that position. Those individuals would have to face that decision and make that judgment. It is right that under this model people cannot hold both offices, just as an elected mayor cannot also hold a ward councillor position. It is part of the separation of executive and policy.
Finally—this comes back to the point that I have been trying to get across to the Committee—it would be the council’s decision whether to go for this model. If it was aware of the possibility of forcing by-elections and took the view that it might be damaging to its democracy because of turnout or other factors—it is not right for me to pre-empt its considerations—I assume that it would not go for that model. But it would be a consequence of the model that is being put forward. I hope that factually answers the hon. Gentleman’s question.

Philip Dunne: It certainly answers the first part of the question. The second part of the question is whether there are any precedents anywhere in the world for such a system.

Phil Woolas: The second part of the question was about the hon. Member for South Staffordshire but you, Mr. Benton, will not allow me to go down that road.
In this country the traditional way of filling a vacancy is through a by-election and that is what we are providing for, but there are other approaches in other European countries. For example, in France some elected representatives have a deputy elected alongside them. One could point to the example of the list system in the European Parliament. Those two systems avoid the need for by-elections, but I do not believe that that is a better alternative. It is better to give the public the say at the end of the day. While this model is not based on examples of by-election processes in other parts of the world there are directly elected executive models in parts of Europe, particularly in France. I hope again that that is a factual answer to the hon. Gentleman’s question.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 44 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 45 to 49 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 50

Time limit for holding further referendum

Andrew Stunell: I beg to move amendment No. 102, in clause 50, page 36, line 11, leave out ‘ten’ and insert ‘four’.

Joe Benton: With this it will be convenient to discuss amendment No. 103, in clause 50, page 36, line 13, leave out ‘five’ and insert ‘four’.

Andrew Stunell: The clause deals with the time limit within which a further referendum can be held to change governance arrangements. The Bill specifies a period of 10 years in England and five in Wales. Why there is a difference is an interesting question, and I am sure that the Minister has a suitable explanation. The period seems to us to restrict the choices open to a community for changing its governance arrangements if it discovers that it has made a mistake.
The amendments propose that no referendum could be held within four years, rather than the 10 or five specified. I am interested to hear the Minister’s reasoning because, given all the emphasis he has placed on getting the model right and providing local choice and diversity, I would have thought that he would want to facilitate rather than obstruct an opportunity to correct an error—learning from the Stoke-on-Trent example, let us say.

Phil Woolas: I repeat my earlier point about the Stoke-on-Trent experience: Stoke-on-Trent that chose that model and now wants to move away from it. It was not imposed upon Stoke by the Government, nor is it being taken away against the will of the people of Stoke-on-Trent. That is the consequence of devolution, and one must live with it.
 As the hon. Gentleman said, the clause extends the period within which no more than one referendum can be held from five to 10 years for authorities in England. That change will provide increased stability for executive arrangements and prevent see-sawing between different leadership models. He referred to situations in some councils around the country.
There is a difference between the provisions for England and Wales is because of powers that are given to Wales in clauses that we shall debate later. I expect that, as a consequence of those powers being given, the Welsh limit will change to 10 years, but it would be premature on the one hand to devolve powers to Wales and on the other to dictate what the period should be. This is another champagne moment, although the hon. Gentleman looks as though he is more interested in a red wine moment.
It is right that people should have the opportunity to express their views on and influence their council’s leadership. As I said earlier, communities will still be able to petition for a referendum for an elected mayor, and we are extending that provision to directly elected executives. Local people will also have an opportunity to make their views known whenever a council proposes to change its executive arrangements.

Andrew Stunell: I have understood the Minister to be saying that in the meantime, before the 10 years are up, a petition could be launched by local residents. Is he saying that, in that case, the provision would not have effect or would be superseded, or is he saying that the petition would lie on the Table until the 10 years were up?

Phil Woolas: Let me finish my point, because the situation will become clear and it will save the Committee time.
 After earlier debates, Opposition Members should be in no doubt that in order to plan for and deliver the strategies that we all want, the Government believe that leadership needs to be strong and accountable. It is the latter of those criteria that the amendment would affect. It would mean that a council’s executive arrangements could be changed by referendum every four years, which would mean that every four-year term of office could be subject to a referendum on executive arrangements. If a referendum supported change, the executive would of course be undermined. The amendment would make that a possibility in every consecutive term of office. The turbulence caused by that situation would not be conducive to enabling councillors to improve their communities. In fact, it would be highly disruptive. That is why we propose to revise the provision under the Local Government Act 2000 to extend the minimum period between referendums from five to 10 years in England to give new executive arrangements the time they need to bed down and then to provide the stronger leadership that will benefit their area. To repeat my point on Wales, we propose no change to the five-year moratorium, as the Welsh Assembly has expressed no desire as yet to change it. Of course, the decisions of the Assembly anticipate our deliberations on the enabling powers contained in the Bill.
I understand the intention behind the amendments. The hon. Member for Hazel Grove wants further to increase people’s abilities to change their council’s executive arrangements. However, there is a balance to be struck between providing opportunities for communities to express their views and the stability that provides the foundations for that better and stronger leadership. I believe that we have struck the right balance. The petitions that are held now would, of course, lead to a referendum. Until the Bill is enacted, the five-year moratorium applies. After the enactment, the 10-year moratorium will apply to provide the stability that I have talked about.
I repeat the policy that I expressed before: the route by which an executive arrangement is created is the route that must be used to unpick it. In other words, the decision of a council can never overturn a decision of the people in a referendum. I hope that that answers the hon. Gentleman’s points.

Andrew Stunell: I must say that I found that another disappointing answer from the Minister. The Bill would double the length of time that it would take for a local community to unpick arrangements that it believed were flawed and needed to be changed. The Minister—or his successor—will come to regret that, because he will find that there will be occasions where it would be expedient for the Government to allow local communities to exercise that choice and not to be inhibited by primary legislation that puts that barrier in place. Nevertheless, I have made my point, I have heard the Minister and I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 50 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 51 to 54 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 55

Appointed councillors

Andrew Stunell: I beg to move amendment No. 121, in clause 55, page 41, line 15, leave out subsection (4).

Joe Benton: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments:
No. 122, in clause 55, page 41, line 17, at end add—
‘(2) No person appointed by virtue of this section may vote in any matter coming before the council to which that person has been appointed.’.
No. 123, in clause 55, page 41, leave out lines 26 and 27.
No. 115, in clause 55, page 41, line 30, at end insert—
‘(g) the degree of representation of the wider community’.

Andrew Stunell: The purpose of the first three amendments, all tabled by me and my hon. Friends, is to get rid of the proposed appointed parish councillors. There are many proposals in the Bill relating to parish councils that we strongly agree with and welcome. Bearing in mind some of the harsher things that I have had to say earlier today, let me say straight away that I believe the Government are approaching the parishes issue appropriately and we shall support them, on the whole. However, we believe that in respect of the provision of appointed councillors they have stepped off the path.
It should be remembered that parish councils already have the capacity to co-opt. They may co-opt to fill vacancies, and they frequently do. Indeed, the people they co-opt to vacancies would, in many cases, conform to the intentions here. However, they are co-opted if there are not enough candidates to contest an election, never mind to have one, and if vacancies remain afterwards. We think that parish councils ought to retain that democratic element and that those who serve on them should do so as a result of an electoral process, and not following an entirely separate appointment. Amendment No. 121 simply reads: “leave out subsection (4)”, which relates to appointed councillors, because we believe that the intention is mistaken. Amendment No. 122 would provide that any such appointed person could not vote on any matter before the council. In other words, they would be non-voting members of the parish council.

Patrick Hall: Will the hon. Gentleman clarify the distinction between a co-opted councillor and an appointed one?

Andrew Stunell: Co-option is a power that parish councillors have already, provided that there is an unfilled vacancy on the council. It is a second-best situation, so to speak, in order to make up the numbers to the total of the council’s representation. The Government’s proposal is perhaps for the Minister to explain, but I understand from the clause and explanatory notes that they believe a wider range of people might serve on parish councils as a result. But, that might be said of Parliament and of principal councils. I wonder whether the Government think that in order to get a wider range of people into Parliament it would be a good idea just to appoint them. Actually, I suspect they do think that that is rather a good idea. If parish councils are to be, say, residents associations or some sort of sounding boards, that is fine as we need all sorts of representatives. However, if they are to be democratic institutions, they should comprise those who have stood for election and been voted in, regardless of whether or not they are community leaders.
On a separate and rather important practical point, the selection of appointees will be in the hands of parish councillors whose views on whom should be selected might vary quite a lot from those of the Minister. We therefore believe we should retain parish councils as democratic institutions and not—as was suggested in a sedentary comment—turn them into a version of the House of Lords where the great and the good are added to those who can be bothered to get elected. In very many parish communities, if people know that they have two means of getting on to the parish council—going through the hassle of standing and getting elected or sitting back, waiting and getting appointed—the number of people offering themselves for election will not increase. The process proposed by the Government will undermine the democratic nature of parish councils and I hope very much that the Minister will accept the amendments.

Roberta Blackman-Woods: Amendment No. 115 is essentially a probing amendment to tease out the circumstances in which councillors can be appointed. I would like some reassurance from the Minister that the clause will not simply provide a mechanism for those with the largest and most organised voices in a community to get undue representation on parish councils, which in the future might have considerably greater powers than they do now. The Minister will be aware that some people who work with the most vulnerable, excluded and disadvantaged groups can easily be overlooked because they do not seek credit for themselves. They are exactly the sort of people who would make excellent appointees.
Given the hour, I shall not labour the point, but I simply ask the Minister whether regulations would ensure that a balance of community representation is maintained and encouraged when appointments are made.

Joe Benton: I call Phil Woolas.

Angela Smith: That may be a champagne moment.
The clause that hon. Members seek to amend will allow parish councils to appoint councillors in addition to the normal quota of elected councillors as supplemental councillors co-opted to fill vacancies in the office of elected parish councillor. My hon. Friend the Member for Bedford asked what the difference is. I shall come to that in a moment, but there will be no difference in the council’s role.
I want first to draw a sharp distinction between the official process of co-option and appointment as in the clause. All of us want parish councils to be the focal point of the communities that they serve, and to be as vital and effective in their role as they possibly can be. Some councils embrace that philosophy. If they could appoint people by virtue of their role in the community—for example, local teachers—they would be able to add to their effectiveness.
The hon. Member for Hazel Grove was quite cynical about the great and the good. I believe that parish councils want to embrace a wider group of people than just the great and the good.

Bob Neill: The little and the bad.

Angela Smith: The little and the bad.
 There may be doctors, business people, faith and community leaders, local youth workers; someone suggested the local carnival organiser. They are people who contribute to the life of the community, but perhaps by virtue of the work that they do are not eligible to stand for the council. The appointment of such people could greatly enhance the work of councils, and we want to give power to the councils to appoint them if they wish to. We do not want to require councils to do it, and we will not put any pressure on them to do so. The intention of the clause is simply to enable them to appoint if they believe that people in their area—in their community—can contribute to making the council more effective.
 As long as there are tight limits on the scale of such appointments, we are somewhat less concerned about the notional dilution of the council’s democratic credentials. As we heard, co-option is already commonplace in councils. In some areas, contested elections are relatively rare, particularly in smaller parishes. Co-option may be used to fill a vacancy; if there is no vacancy but somebody has a contribution to make to the life of the parish and to making the parish council more effective, the option is open to the council.
My hon. Friend the Member for City of Durham asked about limits being imposed and the guidance that would be available. Although I cannot go as far as she would like, I can say that I recognise that limits are important. That is why we are seeking a regulation-making power. We want to ensure that the great majority of councillors are elected and that the council as a whole is democratically accountable.

Alistair Burt: I am not unsympathetic to the general point that the Minister is making about having the right people on parish councils, but I am a little concerned that the clause is somewhat bureaucratic. If parish councillors want to consult the right people in the parish to help them achieve something, they can easily ask. The clause creates a new procedure.
Will appointed councillors with no vote and no say also be subject to the Standards Board’s provisions and so on? Will we encourage people to get involved in this way? Surely an informal procedure to ensure that the right people are involved in the council would be better than what is proposed.

Angela Smith: The hon. Gentleman pre-empts some comments that I was about to make. I shall deal with his points now. First, appointed councillors will be covered by the same standards and requirements in respect of behaviour of councillors as any other councillors, because they will be full councillors. That is the difference. He says that the clause is too bureaucratic because councillors can just ask people for advice. We do not need legislation to ask anybody in the community for advice. If the council wishes to get advice, it can do so. What we are proposing is something different. People will be full councillors and able to vote on all issues other than the co-option or appointment of new members to the council. One of the differences is that the decision on the appointment of new additional councillors will be taken only by elected councillors, not co-optee councillors. I assure the Committee that the regulations proposed will deal with that imperative.
We will also work closely with the National Association of Local Councils and other key stakeholders as we develop the details of the regulations and guidance. As part of that work we need to consider the maximum ratio of appointed councillors to elected councillors that will be permitted. At this stage, a maximum ratio of 1:4 or 1:3 would be a sensible rule. We also need to consider how long councillors’ appointments should last.
The hon. Gentleman implicitly asked why people would not stand for election in the normal way. As I said at the beginning, there may be good reasons why people cannot stand for election. For example, it may be in someone’s conditions of employment that they cannot stand for election when, nevertheless, they may have a contribution to make. It may not be appropriate to someone’s profession that they stand for election: for example, a local doctor may feel that it is inappropriate for him or her do so. Whatever the reason, such people may have the expertise, experience or commitment to their area and feel that they would be an asset to the council and be willing to serve.
Amendments Nos. 48 and 121 proposed by the hon. Member for Hazel Grove would wreck the measure. I understand that is where he is coming from, but we oppose those amendments. Amendment No. 122 would allow councils to appoint members but would then prevent those appointees from taking part in decisions that require a vote. I am worried about the hon. Gentleman because several times during proceedings he has described himself as being disappointed and I feel that I may be disappointing him again. As I said to the hon. Member for North-East Bedfordshire, we do not want appointed councillors simply to be advisers to the council: they are not observers to councils; they are there for councillors. Someone who cannot vote on any matter coming before the parish council cannot be said to be a councillor. As I have already pointed out, councils do not need legislation to allow them to take advice from people in the communities; they can do that already. We want the councillors who are brought in to have the same voting rights as elected councillors, with the exceptions that I have mentioned.

Andrew Stunell: I draw the Under-Secretary’s attention to paragraph (3)(d) which says that the regulations will deal, among other things, with
“the right of persons appointed to participate in decision-making by the council (including voting)”.
In other words, the Minister’s own Bill envisages circumstances in which that right to vote might be circumscribed by the regulations. What is her objection to putting that in the Bill?

Angela Smith: The regulations that we are talking about apply to very minor cases. The example I gave was that it would be completely wrong for an appointed member of a council to take part in a vote to appoint another member. That is very limited and the hon. Gentleman is looking at a far wider picture than that envisaged in the regulations. Why would people want to come forward—for example, a youth worker or somebody working in the community—and spend time engaging with and being part of a council if, as the hon. Gentleman suggests, they were not allowed to vote and take part in proceedings? I should confirm that people appointed would be subject to the Standards Board code of conduct for councillors and would be expected to behave in accordance with that.
Amendment No. 123 would prevent the Secretary of State from regulating the right of persons appointed to councils to participate in decision making. That was the effect the hon. Gentleman was looking for, but I have given reasons why that should be the case. We want to take the opportunity to look at the proper limits that there should be on those councillors.
Amendment No. 115 seeks to empower the Secretary of State to regulate the appointment of councillors and their subsequent holding of office by making provision about the degree of representation in the wider community. This amendment is rather different and I have some sympathy with the objectives that have been set out. My hon. Friend the Member for City of Durham said it was a probing amendment, and unfortunately if it is put to the vote, I must ask the Committee to vote against it. However, it makes a constructive suggestion and one that I hope parishes will take on board. My hon. Friend gave clear reasons why she has concerns, but one of the reasons I must ask the Committee to reject the amendment is because it offers no definition of the wider community. We take it to be a reference to the democratic make-up of the parish in which the appointment was made, but it is quite vague and could be a recipe for trouble later on. For that reason, we have to resist the amendment.
 There are, however, more fundamental reasons why we have to resist, and I am sure that my hon. Friend will understand. She wants to allow the Secretary of State somehow to put the onus on parish councils to correct failures of the democratic process by delivering a set of councillors that better reflects the make-up of the community from which they are drawn. For example, there might not be enough women councillors, or an older council might need youth representation. The council’s make-up might have a different balance from that of the community as a whole.
The purpose of the measures is to be fairly permissive to councils and to give parish councils the flexibility that might be helpful to them, but we are reluctant to set any expectation that the Secretary of State will interfere by regulation to correct some perceived failure of the democratic process. That is not our purpose, and we do not think that it is achievable in practice. I accept my hon. Friend’s comments about the loudest voice being heard. We want parish councils to be able to look around their communities for expertise that could be of use. Often, those voices are not heard or are not the loudest, but such people have a role to play in the community.
These are modest measures intended to assist councils. We want to allow parish councils to appoint additional members, but not on a scale that would be seen by right-minded people seriously to undermine the democratic process. We must ask whether allowing appointments of one or just a few extra councillors is a suitable basis on which to adjust the make-up of parish councils to reflect the communities they serve. We think that it is very difficult and probably wrong to try to achieve that in such a way. In our view, it would be better to trust the good judgment of parish councils to ascertain which people will be an asset and serve the community best. The measures will give them some room to manoeuvre, and the intention is clear.
The measures will be a useful step forward. We think that they will not damage local democracy but indeed enhance it, and I hope that hon. Members will therefore not press their amendments. Otherwise, I shall ask the Committee to join with me in rejecting them.

Andrew Stunell: The Under-Secretary made a flying start this morning, but as she predicted, it has ended in disappointment. She said some interesting things. She seems to have a model of how parish councils operate. I am pleased to see that the Department has such a positive picture of them, but there are 26,000 parish councils, which have highly variable performance, and something like 90 per cent. of the Standards Board’s work concerns disputes with or between parish councils. I was not reassured by her comment that the appointed members would be exactly the same as other councillors and subject, as they are, to the Standards Board. That does not fill me with a positive feeling about the proposal.
 The Under-Secretary says that she does not want to see any restriction on appointments, except in the most minor way to prevent councillors from appointing their friends, which is sensible. However, to rule out the possibility that such appointees might have an agenda of their own that goes beyond their role as, say, youth worker or doctor or vicar, and might see their primary route to the parish council as being through the electoral system seems to be a disappointing discounting of the value of democracy in parishes. I shall not ask the Committee to vote on the amendment, but I do make it clear that I believe the clause to be completely misconceived. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Question put, That the clause stand part of the Bill:—

The Committee divided: Ayes 9, Noes 1.

Question accordingly agreed to.

Clause 55 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 56

Extension of power to certain parish councils

Alistair Burt: I beg to move amendment No. 58, in clause 56, page 42, line 3, leave out ‘an eligible’ and insert ‘a’.

Joe Benton: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments: No. 59, in clause 56, page 42, line 4, leave out subsection (4).
No. 60, in clause 57, page 42, line 11, leave out ‘an eligible’ and insert ‘a’.
No. 61, in clause 57, page 42, line 16, leave out ‘an eligible’ and insert ‘a’.
No. 62, in clause 57, page 42, line 17, leave out ‘an eligible’ and insert ‘a’.

Alistair Burt: I am happy to move these amendments briefly in the name of my hon. Friends. We will have an opportunity to talk more about parishes in our next sitting, so I shall not rehearse now a number of the issues that I want to raise in relation to them, but shall confine myself to the amendments.
The purpose of the amendment is to widen the scope for the use of the power to promote well-being. Instead of confining the power to eligible councils, which are effectively those that will be designated under the quality parish councils criteria, the amendment would extend the power and give that opportunity to all councils. That is in line with our general approach of being as permissive as possible in relation to the devolved powers.
Although I support that extension, I offer one caveat that bears on what I said about the previous amendment. At the weekend, I had a meeting with all my parish councils. I split them into two groups and I saw about two-thirds of the 54 parish councils in my constituency. We had a good discussion about the Bill and the various powers that it contains, and one of the clearest messages that came out of the meeting was that although people thoroughly enjoyed being part of the parish council, they were concerned that over time, more and more responsibilities were coming their way and they did not know whether they could find the people to do the job.
I will read two short quotes, the first of which is from Cardington parish council, which said to me in a letter dated 8 January:
“Concern was also expressed that at this time it is already difficult to get people willing to volunteer to become Parish Councillors, the volume of consultation documents that are received for comment, and with the Local Authorities being penalised if they do not meet the Target Dates for responses.”
Stevington parish council said:
“The role of the Council appears to be changing and both the Council and the Clerk will inevitably have to take on more duties; we forsee difficulty in encouraging residents to stand for the Parish Council in the future if the role becomes more onerous.”
I received a number of other similar remarks. Those two comments can be taken to represent them all.
The power to promote well-being is incredibly widely drawn. The Local Government Act 2000 enables the local authority to promote well-being where it considers it will
“achieve any one or more of the following objects—
“(a) the promotion or improvement of the economic well-being of their area,
(b) the promotion or improvement of the social well-being of their area, and
(c) the promotion or improvement of the environmental well-being of their area.”
The various powers that are available to a council that is granted such a power include the power to
“(a) incur expenditure,
(b) give financial assistance to any person,
(c) enter into arrangements or agreements with any person”
and so on.
I hope that the Under-Secretary can briefly give a sense of how she expects the powers to be used by parish councils and why she feels they should be limited by qualifying criteria. Will she also bear in mind that because the powers will exist, and people will seek them, there is a danger that parish councils are being given rather too much to do? Their original purpose is changing and it is difficult to get the right sense because we are caught in a trap. Many parish councils want greater responsibility, but will the extension of powers and more responsibility encourage anyone new to come on board and share the burden with the small group of people who at present give a huge amount of time to local affairs? We had an interesting discussion on the matter with the parish councils and, by and large, the consensus was that they did not think they would encourage new people.
I was disappointed, because members of the Committee are involved in the process of government and it matters a lot to us. I am interested in the Under-Secretary’s thinking on the promotion of well-being. How many councils does she think will take up such a provision? Is she keen for it to be permissive so that if a council wants to take a chance, will it be able to do so rather than fulfilling the criteria of being an eligible council and going down the quality parish council route?
 Will the Under-Secretary give us her view, to which we can return when we discuss other provisions relating to parish councils? The growing bureaucratisation of parish councils is not helping the process of getting more people informally involved. They fear that their involvement is no longer informal but getting more serious. That might not encourage people to engage with local matters in the way that we would like them to.

Angela Smith: I thank the hon. Gentleman for his comments. He shared with us some of the dilemmas of this issue, which we will continue to address in the Committee. I will say something about the reason for this clause being in the Bill and answer his questions in that context.
 The Bill takes forward many of the White Paper’s commitments to empower local government. We want to extend that philosophy to parish councils by giving local people much more freedom in respect of well-being in their own area. Parish councils already have a long list of specific activities and powers and an additional power under section 137 of the Local GovernmentAct 1972 to undertake actions that will bring direct benefit. That power is limited at present, not least because there is a ceiling on the amount of money per head that can be spent by a parish on specific objectives. It is currently £5.54 per annum per person.
Clause 56 will release some parish councils from those constraints and give them additional powers to enable them to promote social, economic and environmental well- being in their areas. Hon. Members will be aware that district councils have that power under the Local Government Act 2000 and they must have regard to their own community strategies in exercising that power. We did not want to place an additional burden on parish councils and require them to develop their own community strategies too. To avoid duplication of bureaucratisation, the Bill says that they must have regard to those strategies prepared by a higher-tier authority. We will not require the parish councils to get into additional bureaucracy themselves. Many parishes anyway produce their own local plans and local authorities are increasingly having regard to local parish plans.
As the hon. Gentleman said, the power of well-being is potentially a very broad power and we do not seek to constrain it by placing statutory limits on eligible parishes’ expenditure, but it would be prudent to have some safeguards in place; the problem is how many there should be. Clearly, not every parish council would have the right to the power of well-being because the size of parish councils varies enormously and so does the work they do, their ambitions and, indeed, their competence.
We want to ensure that those who want to use the new power have the capacity and the competencies to do so and that is where the eligibility criteria come in. The White Paper said that the criteria would be based on the non-statutory quality parish scheme, which provides a good starting point for thinking about the issues. However, I cannot give an assurance that those criteria are automatically sufficient for what we are seeking to do. As hon. Members may be aware, in the quality parish councils scheme, a parish council must be able to demonstrate that it is representative of, and actively engages with, all parts of the community, providing vision, identity and a sense of belonging. It must also demonstrate that it is effectively and properly managed, and has the ability and capacity to take on the enhanced role and responsibility that quality status is likely to bring.
 That is a good starting point for development of the criteria that a parish with power of well-being should have. A number of tests have already been devised. They cover such matters as electoral mandate, qualifications of the clerk of the council, the frequency and administration of council meetings, communication, community and so on.
The hon. Gentleman made some probing comments about whether the Government are seeking to put a duty or obligation on every parish council to have to meet the criteria for power of well-being. We are not—that would be too onerous for certain parish councils, and many would not want it. We are not trying artificially to limit the number of parish councils that could have a power of well-being, but we want to ensure that the power is exercised sensibly and that the parish itself has the competence and ability to exercise the power. The number of parishes with quality parish status is fairly small—approximately 300. That might increase, but not because of a drive to get higher numbers. It will increase if councils want the power, and are sufficiently competent to be given it.
We have discussed matters with the National Association of Local Councils, and the association is broadly content with the Government’s position. When we consider the precise criteria, we shall talk to the association and to other stakeholders, including the LGA. In considering whether the power of well-being should go further than the quality parish scheme, we shall also explore whether, for example, the criteria should address potential financial implications.
We want to devolve power so that local people can have greater influence on services in their own local communities. We want councils to be able to respond better to local circumstances. However, appropriate safeguards have to be attached to devolution, both for the sake of the public and of councillors. By providing suitable appropriate criteria, we can find a way forward that is appropriate for all.

Alistair Burt: The Under-Secretary may not be able to answer now, but let me put an idea in her mind. Parish councils might come forward with a wish to take more powers, or powers that are outside the scope of the power of well-being—especially in relation to planning. They might say to the Government, “If you really want to devolve powers to us that will involve our local community, can we have more control over such and such an issue?”. Will the Government be open to that approach?

Angela Smith: Parish councils are statutory consultees of the higher-tier authority. If that authority wanted the parish council to take on such a role, it would have to ask it to do so, but the Government have no plans to take planning responsibilities away from the councils that currently have those responsibilities. The proposal we are making is different. It is about a power to engage the local community so that that community is at the heart of things. The power of well-being can do that. It is not about putting more onerous duties on parish councillors.
I am mindful of the hon. Gentleman’s comments. They are helpful. Nevertheless, I ask him to withdraw his amendment and to accept the Government’s proposal.

Alistair Burt: I am grateful for the spirit in which the Under-Secretary dealt with the amendment. I am pleased that we shall have more opportunity to explore the issue of parish councils in later sittings, because they are important and they provide a tremendously valuable backbone to local administration in our communities. It will be encouraging if we spend a bit more time on them at our next sitting. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 56 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 57 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
 Further consideration adjourned—[Jonathan Shaw.]

Adjourned accordingly at Eight o’clock till Thursday 22 February at half-past Nine o’clock.